Spiderman Birthday Cake Tutorial

My little guy just turned 4 and he loves Spiderman! We think this is pretty funny because he hasn't seen the movie, just some old cartoons and we've read books with him. For some reason, he has just latched onto the idea of all things Spiderman. He informed me over a month ago that he needed a Spiderman cake and I briefly considered just baking up a 9X13 cake and decorating it with a web. Lucky for him, my creative streak took over.

I bought a G.I. Joe cake pan at a thrift store last year, so I thought, hey, I can make this work.

I whipped up a batch of buttercream icing and did my best to tint it red and blue. It is really hard to get a true red, even using the nice Wilton paste food colors. I'd recommend picking up a ready-made tube of red icing at the store, which is what I did for the black icing.

Now I'm showing you this because I want you to see that you don't have to have a Spiderman pan or even a G.I. Joe pan to make this work. Looking at a picture of Spidey, I began outlining in red.

Next, I filled in with blue using the star tip and I was moving fast, so these are not perfect. Not a wedding cake--just a Spiderman cake for a 4 year old. :)

You can see how Spiderman took shape nicely. One key tip I will share on cake decorating is the importance of outlining. OUTLINING makes your image pop and changes a quick decorating job into something snazzy!

My little men were so excited when they saw the cake in progress! See those bottled tomatoes? Now you know why I was in a hurry to get the cake done before the party.

And here you go. With the black icing, Spidey came alive.

Now, if you're a cake decorating judge, you're going to notice the flaws, but I'm telling you that everyone in my family thought this cake was amazing and that Spiderman looked great.


My four-year-old was shaking he was so excited. Yep, he has a cool Mom (buffs nails on my arm).

With a few simple cake decorating tools, you can create wonderfully tasty cakes for your family too!

I love Wilton products and their website has tons of cool tips. http://www.wilton.com/
Do you have a birthday party coming up? You can spend $20-$30 on a store-bought cake with their 3 inches of frosting...or try your hand at creating one of your own.

DIY Birthday Cake Savings

Cake Mix = $1.59
Buttercream Icing Ingredients = $ .75
Store-bought black icing = $2.25
Thrift store cake pan = $2.00
Food coloring (I already have, really hard to figure out cost per cake, but I'll guestimate) = $ .15
Simple piping bag with 3 tips set = $4.00

Total for homemade Spidey cake = $10.74  OR if you already have the cake decorating tips/food coloring it's only $6.59